Now us old farts have a reason to play World of Warcraft

Not that we ever really needed a reason but now we have scientific proof that we can use to shut down those disapproving looks from the youngsters and party-poopers.

Yes folks science has proven that World of Warcraft is a good thing for older adults to play because it apparently helps improve our diminishing cognitive functions, or at least according to researchers at North Carolina State University anyway.

In testing the researchers found that playing WoW boosted cognitive functioning for us oldsters, especially those of use who scored like crap on cognitive ability tests before we started playing.

Dr. Anne McLaughlin, assistant professor of psychology at NC State as well as being a co-author on the paper of the study, says that World of Warcraft was chosen because they felt it had the attributes that could produce results as it is a cognitively challenging game with a socially interactive environment and one that presented users with novel situations.

The study first tested the cognitive functioning of the study group which was aged between 60 and 77 in order to get a baseline. The cognitive abilities that they were looking at included spatial ability, memory, and how well the participants could focus their attention.

An “experimental” group of study participants then played WoW on their home computers for approximately 14 hours over the course of two weeks, before being re-tested. A “control” group of study participants did not play WoW, but were also re-tested after two weeks.

Comparing the cognitive functioning test scores of participants in the experimental and control groups, the researchers found the group that played WoW saw a much greater increase in cognitive functioning, though the effect varied according to each participant’s baseline score.

“Among participants who scored well on baseline cognitive functioning tests, there was no significant improvement after playing WoW – they were already doing great,” McLaughlin says. “But we saw significant improvement in both spatial ability and focus for participants who scored low on the initial baseline tests.” Pre- and post-game testing showed no change for participants on memory.